CFP: Modern Danish Philosophy and the Philosophical Traditions

Modern Danish Philosophy and the Philosophical Traditions

Short call for papers

This special theme of Danish Yearbook of Philosophy will review trends, exemplarity and uniqueness in 20th century Danish philosophy. Studies can relate to individual Danish philosophers or special Danish traditions. But focus can also be on major international schools such as positivism, phenomenology and others, fields such as philosophy of language, philosophy of science, metaphysics, aesthetics and ethics, or other international traditions, schools or disciplines, and the way they have influenced Danish philosophy.

With Søren Kierkegaard's unique Christian existentialism as a possible exception, there is no such thing as a specific Danish school in philosophy. Or so it may seem. Hence, developments within Danish philosophy apparently mirror closely international philosophical traditions, as would be expected of academic activities in a small country. Denmark's geographical location in Europe, however, roughly equidistant from the philosophical centres of gravity, i.e. Germany, England and France, might be thought to allow Danish philosophers to relate more freely to the central traditions of the discipline and to combine ideas from several of them. Hence, even though there are notorious antagonisms between those important international philosophical schools and traditions that we name after their national origins, i.e. Anglo-Saxon vs. Continental philosophy, and within the latter, German vs. French philosophy, Danish philosophy as a whole has surely benefitted from all of them.

One could even speculate that Danish philosophers might have put their own distinctive stamp on the way in which the traditions are appropriated within the national academic philosophy. This possible freedom and originality would be facilitated by the fact that Danish philosophers operate within the framework of their own distinct national langue and thus are not linguistically preconditioned by any of the great European traditions of thought and culture.

This special theme of Danish Yearbook of Philosophy will explore this hypothesis. We want to review trends, exemplarity and uniqueness in 20th century Danish philosophy. Studies can relate to individual Danish philosophers or special Danish traditions. But focus can also be on major international schools such as positivism, phenomenology and others, fields such as philosophy of language, philosophy of science, metaphysics, aesthetics and ethics, or other international traditions, schools or disciplines, and the way they have influenced Danish philosophy. Whatever the format, however, the contributions should revolve around the possible relations between Danish philosophy and its outside, identifying influences, interactions and distinctive features in the way international philosophical thought is adopted within Danish thinking.

We invite contributions addressing these topics. We especially encourage two kinds of contributions, one adopting an inside-out approach, the other an outside-in approach. The former would start from an examination of a particular area of philosophical activity within 20th century Danish philosophy and would proceed to trace its possible sources within broader international philosophical trends. The outside-in approach would start by identifying a particular international trend and proceed to describe the specific form this trend assumed within Danish philosophy.